Not grooming gays - Thwaites urges tolerance and love for homosexuals; says no to condoms in schools

EIGHT MONTHS after withdrawing a controversial textbook from the education system, portfolio Minister Ronald Thwaites has announced that it is to be reintroduced.

However, when it reaches the hands of students, the book will be devoid of the homosexual material that had caused it to be pulled.

Speaking in the House of Representatives on Wednesday, Thwaites said the Government would not be a part of grooming students towards same-sex unions.

"This Government lifts up to our children the ideal of faithful love and marriage between a man and a woman as the basis of a family, even as we insist on tolerance and love for those who are disposed towards homosexuality," Thwaites said.

The controversial Health and Family Life Education Programme (HFLEP) curriculum, which was withdrawn last September, provides for grades seven to nine students to be quizzed on whether they had ever been involved in homosexual and heterosexual sex.

Thwaites has said that at least two persons involved in the drafting of the controversial curriculum had a gay agenda.

School not a romping shop

Speaking in the Sectoral Debate yesterday, the minister said "we will not be grooming children towards same-sex unions and we will not be distributing condoms in schools."

According to the minister, guidance counsellors and their counterparts in schools and community health systems must know what to do when a student is in danger of sexual abuse.

"School is not a romping shop," Thwaites insisted while arguing that restraint must be taught by example and precept.

"Sex education, yes, condoms no," the minister said.